I am Here
by Silvermoon424
Summary: Even Queens have to be mothers. On a dark and lonely night, Neo-Queen Serenity and Small Lady bond over a nightmare and a treat.


"Mama?"

The Queen was awakened from her sleep by a tiny, hesitant voice.

"...Mama?"

Upon hearing the second, plaintive plea, Serenity finally opened her eyes. Squinting in the darkness, she could make out a small silhouette standing by the edge of her bed. Serenity risked a quick glance over to her still-sleeping husband beside her. Their daughter's presence had not awoken him.

"Small Lady? What's the matter?" Serenity whispered. She was slightly alarmed; her daughter rarely had any trouble at night and was a sound sleeper. Even in the dark, she could see that Small Lady's eyes were wide with fear.

"I… I had a nightmare…" Small Lady whispered. She looked almost ashamed, as if she somehow had control over whether or not she would have a nightmare and had failed.

Beside Serenity, Endymion stirred in response to the voices of his wife and daughter. Unwilling to wake her husband over a matter she felt she could capably take care of herself, Serenity decided to move their conversation elsewhere.

"Small Lady, we don't want to wake Papa. Let's go down to the kitchen and get you some warm milk, then we can talk about it, okay?" she whispered.

Small Lady nodded her affirmation as her mother quietly rolled out of the very large, lush bed she and Endymion shared and took her daughter's hand. They silently made their way out of the room and down to the enormous, well-stocked kitchen that sparkled with cleanliness. Serenity sat Small Lady on one of the chairs surrounding the kitchen table and walked over to the fridge.

"Well, we don't want to wake Jupiter up just to make us a midnight snack," Serenity started. "But I think I can handle a glass of milk!"

The small child smiled at this and nodded. Serenity took out a bottle of milk and set it on the counter before removing a saucepan from the cabinet under the stove. She placed the saucepan on the stove before opening the bottle and pouring some into the saucepan. As Serenity turned the burner on and the milk began to warm, she turned back to her child. "Now, what was this about a nightmare?"

Small Lady gulped and turned her gaze down to the floor. "I… well, there was this lady…" Small Lady began hesitantly. "This lady with really long, pretty black hair and a pretty dress… but the weird thing was she was in a mirror! People can't go in mirrors!"

Serenity froze.

"And, um, she looked at me and her eyes… they were really scary, like snake's eyes! She looked so angry with me but Mama, I swear I didn't do anything!"

"No." Serenity said firmly. "Of course you didn't do anything!" Small Lady was a bit surprised by her ordinarily calm mother's reaction. She looked at Serenity wide-eyed.

"I mean…" Serenity was embarrassed by her outburst. The last thing she needed was her child on edge because of something she said. "You said you didn't do anything, right? That lady must have been upset about something else." The woman paused. "Maybe something someone else did to her."

"Oh, I guess that makes sense!" Small Lady grinned but the smile quickly faded as she recalled the rest of her nightmare. "Uh, she reached out and her hands came out of the mirror! Right out! She started reaching for me and I screamed and ran away because she looked so scary, but then I tripped over something. And when I looked down it was her _hair!__"_

The Queen had been so engrossed by the story she didn't notice that the milk was already steaming. Snapped out of her reverie, she quickly turned off the burner and walked over to the cabinet above the sink to retrieve a glass. Setting the glass down, she grabbed an oven mitt from the drawer near the stove and removed the saucepan, pouring the milk into the glass. As she did this, her daughter prattled on.

"I started screaming again and she began pulling me to her with that hair… I think she wanted me inside the mirror! I was so scared!" Recounting the nightmare, the young child shivered. "And then... I woke up and came to you, Mama."

Walking over to the table, Serenity placed the glass in front of her child, who began gulping it greedily. "Small Lady…" Serenity warned. "That's not very ladylike!"

Small Lady froze in shock. If she wanted to become a real Lady like her mother, she couldn't gulp milk! Setting the glass down, she took a deep breath before picking it up again before sipping the milk in a much more ladylike manner. Serenity smiled at this. She loved her daughter more than words could describe. Even knowing, and loving, Chibiusa in the past had not prepared her for the extend of her maternal love towards her daughter. Although she had been nervous about motherhood after discovering she was pregnant, after her child was born, she found that motherhood fit her like an old glove. Certainly having a wonderful mother herself- well, actually, _two _mothers- had helped her out.

Thinking of her other mother, the one she technically was no longer related to by blood but still very much in spirit, Serenity realized she had the perfect tool to calm her daughter down.

"Small Lady, I'm going to tell you something _my_ mother told _me_ when I was around your age."

"Grandma?" Small Lady asked, brightening. No doubt she was thinking of her Grandma Ikuko, who was very much a part of her life.

"Yes, your grandma, but not Grandma Ikuko." Serenity said, wondering how she could possibly explain such a complex situation regarding her parentage to her daughter.

"Who then?" Small Lady asked, tilting her head.

"Well, let's just say that she was my mother for a time… but that's not important. What's important is what she told me." Small Lady looked a bit confused, but nodded and listened.

"She said to me, 'Each one of us carries a star within our hearts. Light and dark always accompany each other. But if you let the darkness know that you are afraid of it, the darkness with become great and swallow you up, and it will swallow your light. If you don't want the darkness to trouble you, then you must take care to make sure that the star in your heart is always shining brightly.'" Serenity took a breath. "Do you understand?"

Small Lady hesitated for a while. She was bright for her age and seemed to understand the meaning behind the story. "Yes," She finally said. "I understand, Mama."

"I knew you would!" Serenity smiled. Small Lady finished sipping her milk and placed the glass on the table. "Come on, let's go back to bed. We can clean up in the morning."

Small Lady nodded and, once again, took her mother's hand as she led her back up to where the bedrooms were. As they made their way up the stairs and down the hallway, they paused in front of Small Lady's room.

"Mama… can I sleep with you and Papa tonight?" Small Lady asked sheepishly.

Serenity smiled. "Of course you can! That big bed of ours gets lonely sometimes."

Hand in hand, mother and daughter made their way. The darkness would not trouble them tonight.


End file.
